open hostility to the State
system of education, which is the true national system, and several of
the most important were opened for the purpose of receiving boys
expelled from or punished in other schools for taking part in political
demonstrations of a most reprehensible character. Their subsequent
history has accorded with the spirit in which they were founded and
their close connexion with forms of political agitation most unhealthy
for young minds has been evinced in many a regrettable incident.

THE OUTLOOK.

If we review the present position we find that during the past year
there has been some subsidence of the acute stage of the malady, or
rather it has taken a different turn. The bulk of the reasonable
inhabitants have become wearied of the senseless agitation which brings
annoyance and suffering without doing them good. There is less active
boycott and the ordinary citizen has become less amenable to the leaders
of the agitation. But in spite of this, two circumstances stand
out--first, the local leaders have not in general abated one tittle of
their efforts to enforce the boycott, and where in any locality they
showed signs of resting, their chiefs are ready to urge them forward;
secondly, the perversion of our young men has reached a most alarming
stage, not merely from the point of view of the crime and the sense of
insecurity that it engenders, but also from the more general aspect of
the character and prospects of the rising generation. Many parents have
most bitter reason to lament their failure to guide, control, and
restrain their children. On the 7th August boycott celebrations occurred
at the headquarters of each district of the Dacca division, and at a
number of places in the interior. The boycott vow was everywhere renewed
and at several meetings speeches were delivered, the tendency and object
of which was to excite renewed disaffection and to stir up zeal for the
cause. The observances for the 16th October were prescribed in an order
of the chiefs published in the Calcutta papers, and the local leaders
did their best to carry out these instructions. Rakhibandan bathing,
abstinence from cooked food, and the solemn renewal of the boycott vow
were the principal features. In some places public meetings were held
and again the tone of several speakers was most reprehensible. District
conferences and other similar meetings played their usual important part
in the year's programme. In the Dacca divis